State of the Countryside 2007: Living in the Countryside

This chapter examines the social elements of life in the countryside. Living in the countryside can have many benefits for the majority of rural people, but this broad level view hides a number of complex patterns and trends on a range of social issues.

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Some key facts

• In the last 20 years the proportion of young people aged 15 to 29 in rural areas has fallen from 21% to 15%.

• In the smallest rural communities, 87.5% of low income households (those who earn less than £21,600 per annum) run one car and 30.6% run two. This compares to 45.9% and 8.1% respectively in urban areas.

• Downstream internet bandwidth of between 4 and 8mbps is available to 4.2% of households in villages, hamlets and isolated dwellings and 23.7% of households in urban settlements.

• Over the three years to 2005/2006, there has been a steady increase in the total number of new housing completions in rural areas (to just under 45,000 in 05/06). This remain lower than the level of completions in the late 1990’s.

• The average rural house price, £240,222, was 22.5% higher than the average urban house price of £196,700 in 2006.

• Rural areas have fewer people who suffer from mental health problems than are found in urban areas.

• 65.9% of pupils living in less sparse villages and hamlets achieved 5 or more A* to C grades at GCSE in 2004/5, compared to 53.1% for pupils living in less sparse urban areas.

• The dominant trend in rural areas is a fall in recorded crime of up to 27%. However, a significant minority of rural districts have seen an increase and two districts in Cumbria have experienced increases, from low levels, of over 20%.

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